Vigilante (Dangerous Times Collection Book #3)

cancer. . . .

1

Nolan Gray gritted his teeth and closed his eyes as the pistol was aimed at his face from just inches away. The barrel of the SIG Sauer P226 was so close, he could clearly see the tiny gold anchor engraved on its left side, designating it as a standard Navy Special Forces weapon.

Beads of sweat beneath Nolan’s mop of unkempt hair gave way to droplets, and traced a path on his skin down to his eyes, nose, ears, and neck. He was waiting for the pain, knew it was coming any second, but despite his immense training and experience, it was still an incredible thing to know you’re about to be shot.

Finally he blinked when the gun never went off.

Look . . . said Branford, the man across from him. His arm never wavered, his hand never shook. It was steady and sure, outstretched directly toward Nolan’s head. Branford’s crusty voice never sounded anything but confident. His comment was one of clarification.

Nolan was becoming angry, his carefully attuned discipline threatening to falter. The moment was at hand. There wasn’t time for this, not now.

The light of the moon was brighter than the nearest street lamp. Nolan glanced around, the city eerily silent at this dark hour, yet he could detect a distant bicycle, a jogger—probably female, from the sound of the footfalls—and someone coughing. Sooner or later one of these passersby was going to cross his path, and he was going to lose his chance.

Just do it! insisted Nolan.

Branford’s hand cinched tighter around the polymer grips of the matte black P226, so tight his knuckles showed white. Still he never quivered, the gun an immovable mass of metal that could have been grafted to his arm.

Nolan closed his eyes and braced himself again.

This is asking an awful lot. . . . muttered the other man.

Nolan’s eyes popped open, and he choked down the outrage rising within him. There isn’t anybody else! he said through bared teeth. "You think Arjay could do this?"

And if I miss? asked Branford, his voice the bark of a Rottweiler.

You would never miss, Nolan said without hesitation.

Always a first time, griped Branford with a sigh. All right. On three. One . . .

Nolan steeled himself one last time. He closed his eyes when Branford reached two.

Branford squinted slightly, adjusting the angle of his weapon by the slightest degree. Three.

The sound was swallowed by the SIG’s attached silencer, but Nolan never heard a thing, even at such close range. Instead, he was on fire with a pain so intense it brought rushing back long-suppressed memories of the horrors he’d been subjected to during the war.

And just when he was about to allow himself to pass out from the powerful sensation and the crippling memories it brought, another shot rang out, and the pain became twice as searing.

He couldn’t hold on any longer.

This was the end. His end.

As it should be. As it was meant to be. Nolan Gray was no more.

———

Aaron Branford stared at the man on the ground, his blood seeping into the soil. A brief examination later, he glanced around the area in every direction, careful to ensure that no one had heard the muffled shots from his sidearm.

Satisfied, Branford quickly retrieved a shoe box–sized package from a nearby bush and placed it on the ground beside Nolan’s body. As he opened the box, he pulled out a phone from his pants pocket and dialed the only number saved to the phone’s memory.

He set to work on the box’s many contents, placing them in the proper positions while waiting impatiently for the phone to be answered.

Branford? shouted a smooth voice over a pronounced clamoring of metal.

Who else would it be, genius? Branford growled back, peeking around the area again for unwanted eyes. Nobody else has this number, Arjay.

On the other end of the line, Branford could hear the crackling of soldering in the background. You were successful? shouted Arjay over the noise.

The trigger’s been pulled, Branford said, the phone held between his ear and his shoulder as he continued to put the objects from the shoe box on the ground. You better be on schedule.

My work is well in hand was Arjay’s smooth reply.

A gruff hm was all Branford gave as a reply. You’d best do everything you can to give him the advantage, you hear me? I’ve got to get off the street. Once things have simmered down, I’ll check in.

There was a pause. And then what? asked Arjay.

Branford creased his eyebrows, his worn, leathery skin nearly cracking. Then we begin, he replied, and snapped shut the phone.

2

President Thornton Hastings sat up, his mind unable to accept the information that had just been relayed to him from his bedside phone. It was 2:51 in the morning and he had the sensation that he might be stuck in a dream. But then the fog cleared and he was suddenly alert.

Quietly, so as not to awaken his wife, Glenda, he slipped out of bed and carried the pearl-colored phone to the outer room of their White House living space.

I’m going to need you to repeat that, said Hastings into the phone.

On the other end was the voice of FBI Director Bob Yeager, speaking low and reverent, underscoring the magnitude of the tragic news he was giving to the president of the United States.

A small explosion—maybe a couple grenades or a stick of dynamite—went off in Central Park tonight, Mr. President, said Yeager. NYPD believes that an individual was in close proximity to the bomb when it went off—possibly holding it—because trace human remains have been recovered in the radius of the blast. I’m afraid a set of dog tags were found on the scene—tags identifying the victim as Nolan Gray.

Hastings’ heart thudded heavily, his thoughts spinning. How could something like this happen? And to Nolan, of all people!

Anyone could have been holding those tags. How certain are we that Nolan was the victim? the president asked mechanically. He already knew the answer, but he was obligated to ask.

It was, uh . . . I’m afraid it was a rather gruesome crime scene, sir, replied Yeager. Blood belonging to Lieutenant Gray was found on the grass in patterns consistent with at least two gunshots, probably to the head, in addition to the wider spatter from the bomb blast. Trace amounts of skin tissue and even some bone fragments were also found at the scene; the blood’s a positive match to Lieutenant Gray, and NYPD believes the rest will be as well. The Bureau believes he may have been taken hostage by one of the New York City crime syndicates and killed in this manner as a political statement against you. Or more specifically, a warning about passing the crime bill. I’m deeply sorry, sir.

This couldn’t be real. Nolan Gray was not someone you simply kidnapped or even murdered. Hastings had once witnessed Nolan single-handedly take down over a dozen enemy soldiers without benefit of a weapon.

Still, this isn’t the battlefield, Hastings mused. Nolan has been a private citizen for almost a decade now. Maybe he got soft.

He immediately scolded himself for criticizing Nolan now that he was dead and gone. But his next thought was no better.

If someone killed Nolan as a way of hurting me . . . well, they certainly knew what they were doing.

Did Lieutenant Gray have a next-of-kin that we should notify, sir? asked Yeager.

No, replied Hastings. He was raised by his grandmother, and she died years ago—before the war.

Lieutenant Gray . . . Yeager had said. It had been quite a while since anyone had referred to Nolan by his rank. Nine years. Had it really been nine years since . . . ?

He remembered it all so vividly. It was impossible to forget. It had changed his life, just as much as it had changed Nolan’s. The endless horrors of it. Everything that happened in those darkest of days was the primary reason he’d been elected president.

And now Nolan was gone. Dead. Despair seeped into Hastings’ chest, but he pushed it away. There would be a time and a place for that. For now, there were more pressing matters.

Director, said Hastings, it is now your personal priority to find the perpetrator of this crime and bring them to justice. You have no other tasks on your agenda until the assassin is in custody. Do I make myself clear?

Yes, sir, he replied, though Hastings was sure he’d heard a note of hesitation in the man’s voice. Hastings knew he’d set Yeager on an impossible task—bringing to justice what was probably a major crime lord—but he didn’t care.

He clicked the phone off. Another thought occurred to him and he clicked it back on, dialing the White House operator.

Get me Marcus. . . . I’m aware of what time it is, Sarah, just call him.

When Chief of Staff Marcus Bailey’s even-toned voice answered the phone, Hastings could already tell that he wasn’t going to have to deliver the news.

You heard? asked Hastings.

Just, replied Bailey. The two men were so used to working closely together that they used a clipped shorthand when speaking to each other. I just got off with Carson; he expects it to hit the press by daylight, so he’s working on a statement.

That was all well and good, but it wasn’t what Hastings was calling about. I want a state burial at Arlington. Honor brigade, the works, he said.

Bailey sighed on the other end. They’ll fight it on the Hill. With the cutbacks—

I don’t care. Can we win? asked Hastings. He’d been anticipating this argument. Hastings himself had pushed through a budget cutback bill with nothing but his own charisma, a bill that called for all elected officials in Washington, D.C., to take a pay cut, including him. He’d stood before the entire nation at the State of the Union address and argued passionately that he couldn’t ask the American people to shoulder the burden of a staggering budget deficit if their elected senators, congressmen, and president weren’t willing to do their part as well. There was only a smattering of polite applause in the House that evening, but the speech drew such a flood of positive reaction from a recession-weary public that Congress had no choice but to vote in favor of the bill. But behind closed doors, even the senators and congressmen from the president’s own party harbored resentment toward him for taking away a portion of their salaries and many of their benefits.

A pause. It’ll require some serious political capital, Mr. President. We’ll have to call in favors, maybe even make some compromises on the crime bill.

Hastings sobered at these words. With drugs, money laundering, illegal weapons, prostitution, and human trafficking at an all-time high, his promise to make the war on organized crime a federal priority had been one of the key selling points of his election campaign. It had taken over a year to get a bill before Congress that would crack down on crime organizations, but it was currently hung up in a Senate committee comprised of many of his enemies on the Hill. The bill called for the creation of an entirely new law enforcement agency Hastings had dubbed the OCI—Organized Crime Intelligence—which would focus squarely on rooting out the sources of modern organized crime and applying new technologies and techniques to apprehending them for good.

He couldn’t afford to lose the crime bill, for the sake of every person in America. But still . . . "This won’t hurt the crime bill, Marcus. It’ll prove why we need a dedicated agency to root out and destroy organized crime. Nolan Gray is—was—the most respected war hero of our time. Every child in America knows what he did. He was my friend. I owe him my life, many times over."

How could Nolan be dead? He hadn’t spoken to the man in more than five years, but it just seemed impossible that someone with as strong a will to live as Nolan Gray could have died so suddenly, so tragically. Maybe the NYPD was wrong and the DNA analysis would prove it so. Or maybe he’d been right earlier and this was a terrible dream.

Marcus made no reply. He didn’t have to. Hastings could picture the taut expression on his chief of staff’s face.

Make this happen, Marcus, he said. Don’t touch the crime bill, but do whatever it takes.

3

Nolan stirred to the sound of frantic crying.

Was he dead, and his friends and loved ones were weeping over his body? No, of course not, that couldn’t be it.

He didn’t have any friends or loved ones. Hadn’t for years.

His head pounded, the muscles beneath his skin flared and clenched. He could feel the bandages wrapped around most of his head, although the top of his scalp down to his eyes still seemed to be free. He felt the sting of an IV in his arm, slowly dripping needed medication into his veins, dulling the pain by a few degrees.

If things had gone as they’d expected, it had probably been two or three days since Branford had shot him. Days he’d been kept completely unconscious.

Finally he opened his eyes and found himself in an apartment he didn’t recognize. Branford’s place, his mind told him. He didn’t know this apartment, but it was the only place he could have been. It was dark outside, probably the middle of the night from what he could see through the window beside the bed.

The window was cracked, bringing sounds Nolan recognized from the ruined streets of New York City. Horns blaring under the fists of angry drivers. Police sirens screaming, the cars running this way and that through the streets and alleys. Raucous, high-pitched laughter from what sounded like a group of hookers, trolling the sidewalk below in a herd. Screams of the innocent. In the distance, he could even hear gunfire.

The sounds, these reviled disturbances of that which was good, made his pulse quicken. His fists clenched at his sides, involuntarily.

There was so much wrong on the other side of that window. So much pain and cruelty and wickedness. And so many others, simply standing by, watching, doing nothing. Coasting along in apathy.

He massaged his temples, pushing those thoughts aside, unable to bear following their trail any further. Very soon now, things were going to change. It would require an act of wonder, a marvel, to capture the attention of this city and change its beating heart. And a marvel was exactly what he was going to give them.

The sound of horrible moaning and weeping brought him back to the present, and Nolan sat up, his spine straight, his senses alert and focused as he listened. It was the same sound that had first roused him, and it wasn’t coming from the streets below. He glanced around, searching for the source, but he was alone. So where was the wailing coming from? It was getting louder and more desperate by the minute.

No! Barry, please don’t! someone screamed. A woman. It was a loud shout from somewhere nearby, but it was muffled, probably a few walls filtering the sound.

Adrenaline kicked in, and Nolan threw back the bed sheets and ripped the IV needle from his arm.

The woman let out another sob and this time he zeroed in on the sound. Judging by the distance, it was either next door or across the hall. Assuming there was a hall. He had no idea what kind of apartment building Branford lived in.

Nolan rose from the bed and threw on a T-shirt and pair of jeans that had been left for him, anything to avoid running out in nothing but boxers and blood-soaked facial bandages, looking like a crazed mummy. But then he caught a glimpse of himself in the window and realized the gauze would work to his advantage, giving him an element of surprise—and revulsion—from whoever spotted him.

Nolan’s barefoot steps were fast but light as he wound out of the bedroom he’d been resting in, through a small living room and to the apartment’s front door. Branford didn’t seem to be home. He didn’t see any weapons lying around—Branford kept a predictably spartan home—so he’d have to go without. He opened the front door and stepped out into the drab brown hall.

"I’m sorry! I’m sorry I’m-sorry-no-don’t !" screamed the woman.

Nolan had it. It was the apartment immediately to his right. Branford’s next-door neighbor.

He bounded, and in a quick, coiled motion, kicked with one bare foot. The door exploded off its hinges.

Instantly, Nolan took in the scene before him. It was the living room of a black couple who looked to be in their late fifties. The woman was facing Nolan from across the room with her hands in the air, her eyes a mess and cheeks soaked, and her form covered only in a ripped midnight-blue nightgown. There were dark bruises on her bare arms and one eye looked swollen. Her teeth were outlined in thin trails of blood.

Across from the woman, directly between her and Nolan, stood a man—her husband, he assumed. He wore a white dress shirt that spilled out over a light-brown pair of slacks that were held up with black suspenders. He was covered in sweat that soaked through his clothes, and he was aiming a shotgun at the woman. Nolan couldn’t see the guy’s face, but the bitter buttery aroma of whiskey that all but rolled off of him was sharp. The guy was in some kind of alcohol-fueled rage, based on his tightly wound but wobbly posture.

But he didn’t seem to be very skilled with the shotgun, holding it awkwardly up high near his head, as if he were trying to stare down a scope that he didn’t realize wasn’t there.

What had the woman done to set her husband off this day? From what Nolan knew of human behavior, it had probably been something trivial and harmless.

Observing all of this in a fraction of a second, Nolan acted before either the man or his wife realized what was happening.

He sprang forward and slammed the flat of his hand against the left side of the shotgun’s butt. The man instantly lost his clumsy hold on the weapon, which flew back into and across his face, hard, before he dropped it entirely.

Nolan used this moment of confusion to drop to the ground and sweep his leg, knocking the man’s feet out from under him and sending him down onto his rear. Standing tall again, Nolan loomed over the other man, and having already grabbed the shotgun, leveled the weapon at the furious man on the ground, who was writhing, wiping blood from his forehead, and uttering obscenities.

Nolan considered his options. He couldn’t have been the only person in this building to have heard the argument between these two, and the sound he made kicking the door in was even louder. For all he knew, someone may have already dialed 9-1-1.

Stupid, stupid, stupid! Acting with your heart instead of your head!

He hadn’t thought, hadn’t taken the time to get his bearings. He’d merely acted. And now everything he’d worked for, for years, could be jeopardized. At least his identity was well concealed thanks to the bandages.

Okay, okay. Need to control the situation, but the woman has to be the priority. She’s hurt and still in danger. . . .

You should call the police, Nolan whispered to her, never moving his eyes or the gun away from her husband.

No, I can’t, no, she replied, her voice shaking. He’s a cop. Fourteenth precinct.

Nolan felt his shoulders droop slightly. Perfect.

He snapped the pump under the shotgun and stared furiously into the abusive husband’s face, tempted for a moment to forgo the law and finish this neat and clean, now.

I can get you to someplace safe, Nolan said. But what about him?

Just . . . don’t kill him, whimpered the woman, unsteady hands up around her face. Please don’t.

Nolan thought fast. Calling the police was indeed out of the question, for the woman’s sake and his own. He’d just attacked an officer of the law, a wife-beating scumbag, sure, but the police department was notoriously defensive of their own. Besides that, Nolan was officially a dead man, and couldn’t afford to have any connection to this mess.

But this man was no better than a rabid dog. And solutions for dealing with rabid dogs numbered very, very few.

He saw a wood rack right by the broken front door with a trench coat hanging from it. He grabbed the coat with one hand—his other still training the gun on the man on the floor—and tossed it to the woman. She caught it and robotically put her arms into it.

Nolan looked down and felt the bile rising in his throat at this nauseating, depraved excuse for a man. There should be no such thing as abuse. No abusive husbands, no wives living in fear for months or years without end. It was wrong and he could right it.

With a snarling, upturned nostril, he flipped the shotgun around and knocked the man out with the butt of it. The action brought on a brief gasp from the man’s wife, but she quickly fell silent, making no further protests.

Nolan extended his hand without looking her way. Wordlessly, blank-faced, she took it and allowed him to lead her out of her world of darkness.

Into the light.

4

After hurriedly grabbing his things from next door—most importantly his car keys—Nolan threw on some socks and shoes while the woman waited at the apartment’s front door, her head bowed so far over he could see nothing but the top of her skull. Every now and then, he heard her muffled weeping. He threw on a hooded sweatshirt and wrapped a spare jacket around the shotgun to keep it out of view.

Less than two minutes later, he was leading the woman down the two flights of stairs to ground level with the hood of his jacket up around his face to conceal his bandages from the outside world. Out they walked onto the grimy street that reflected the city lights because of the steam pouring out of manholes.

This was the New York City neighborhood called Clinton. Or as it was more colorfully known thanks to its reputation as a longtime haven for organized crime, Hell’s Kitchen.

Thousands of good, decent people lived in Clinton. But just as many of the wicked prowled here too, pushing drugs, recruiting gang members, pimping hookers, and worse. Much worse. An unending turf war was being waged between the good and the bad, and though their numbers were lesser, the immoral were louder, more aggressive, better armed, and ruthless. Hardly a street corner in the neighborhood didn’t house some kind of corrupt, degenerate behavior.

Disgusting . . . he mumbled.

He noticed that the woman at his side was looking down now, with tears in her eyes.

Oh, no—not you, he whispered to her, grimacing and scolding himself internally. I didn’t mean you. I was just . . . looking . . . at everything. . . .

He shook his head, angry at himself. Words were not his thing.

Never turning loose his companion’s hand, he raised his car keys and pushed a button until he heard the familiar bip-boop sound of his gray sedan. The as-nondescript-as-possible vehicle waited just across the street, and he helped the woman into the passenger seat before covertly stowing the hidden shotgun from the jacket.

Nolan quickly took his place at the wheel and started the engine, yet still the woman said not a single word to him.

She probably figured he was taking her to some kind of battered women’s shelter, he decided, and was too ashamed of her situation to say anything just now. It was either that or the hospital, because she needed medical attention, but a shelter would ask fewer questions of her.

As they drove, his eyes scanned the sidewalks, alleys, and storefronts they passed. It was the middle of the night, but still there were hundreds of people out and about. They drove in silence for several minutes before Nolan noticed his new friend staring at his hands with eyes that had grown big. He followed her gaze.

Right, yeah . . . he said quietly, grasping for a way to explain why there were no fingernails on any of his ten fingers in a way that wouldn’t give away his identity. Uh, they were removed. A long time ago, for a . . . medical condition.

His heart sank; even he knew how ridiculous that sounded. The notion that he could have had his own fingernails removed on purpose made him seem crazy, but he couldn’t risk telling her the truth.

He glanced at his fingers and had a terrible thought.

I wasn’t wearing gloves! If this woman’s husband—Barry, was it?—were to call his friends on the force, they would dust for prints, and . . .

And they’ll find that a dead man was at that apartment tonight. You stupid idiot!!

He may not have had nails anymore, but he still had fingerprints like everyone else.

It occurred to him then that the woman had stopped crying. He could see in the corner of his eye, just beyond the edge of his hoodie, that every few seconds she would steal a glance in his direction but then quickly pretend she hadn’t. Her face remained a puffy mess, but she had calmed significantly since getting in the car.

What must this woman think of him? A man whose head was covered in bloody bandages, who had no fingernails, who burst into her home uninvited and stole her away in the middle of the night. Maybe, during her years of abuse, she’d had dreams or fantasies of something exactly like this happening—a knight coming to her rescue, saving her from that hateful man she called a husband, and carting her off to somewhere she’d never have to live in fear again.

Or maybe she was wondering if she’d been kidnapped. At the very least, she had to be considering whom she could trust.

His ponderings came to a halt when she spoke, her voice registering just above a whisper.

Thank you, she said, and he almost didn’t catch it.

He glanced at her, his sharp green eyes taking her in. She was hugging her own torso, clutching the trench coat tightly around her body. Her eyes were still thick with tears, yet she stared at him without judgment or reservation. Only gratitude, and a measure of gentility.

He turned back to watch the road. You’re welcome, he answered, almost as quiet as her.

Now that she’d broken the ice, she was finding it easier to watch him. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but ultimately decided it was beside the point. He had to drop her off somewhere. His mind ran down a list of possible destinations and settled on a home for battered women about twelve blocks away.

Alice, the woman said, and he glanced at her again. He hadn’t really expected her to say anything else. Alice Regan.

Alice. Nice name.

From her expression, she was hoping he would reciprocate. But that wasn’t possible.

She could never know. Not only for his safety, but hers as well.

Several moments passed in silence, and she must have concluded he wasn’t going to speak, so she began again. Nolan wanted to be irritated that Alice kept talking to him instead of letting him strategize in silence, but there was something about her voice and her uncanny calm that